Data extraction is a big part of working on new and innovative projects. But how do you get your hands on big data from all over the internet?

Manual data harvesting is out of the question. It’s too time-consuming and doesn’t yield accurate or all-inclusive results. But between specialized web scraping software and a website’s dedicated API, which route ensures the best quality of data without sacrificing integrity and morality?

What Is Web Data Harvesting

Data harvesting is the process of extracting publicly available data directly from online websites. Instead of only relying on official sources of information, such as previous studies and surveys conducted by major companies and credible institutions, data harvesting allows you to take data harvesting into your own hands.

All you need is a website that publicly offers the type of data you’re after, a tool to extract it, and a database to store it.

The first and last steps are fairly straightforward. In fact, you could pick out a random website through Google and store your data in an Excel spreadsheet. Extracting the data is where things get tricky.

In terms of legality, as long as you don’t go for black-hat techniques to get your hands on the data or violate the website’s privacy policy, you’re in the clear. You should also avoid doing anything illegal with the data you harvest, such as unwarranted marketing campaigns and harmful apps.

Ethical data harvesting is a slightly more complicated matter. First and foremost, you should respect the website owner’s rights over their data. If they have Robot Exclusion Standards in some or all parts of their website, avoid it.

It means they don’t want anyone to scrape their data without explicit permission, even if it’s publicly available. Additionally, you should avoid downloading too much data at once, as that could crash the website’s servers and could get you flagged as a DDoS attack.

Web Scraping Tools

web-scraping

Web scraping is as close as it gets to taking data harvesting matters into your own hands. They’re the most customizable option and make the data extraction process simple and user-friendly, all whilst giving you unlimited access to the entirety of a website’s available data.

Web scraping tools, or web scrapers, are software developed for data extraction. They often come in data-friendly programming languages such as Python, Ruby, PHP, and Node.js.

How Do Web Scraping Tools Work?

Web scrapers automatically load and read the entire website. That way, they don’t only have access to surface-level data, but they can also read a website’s HTML code, as well as CSS and Javascript elements.

You can set your scraper to collect a specific type of data from multiple websites or instruct it to read and duplicate all data that isn’t encrypted or protected by a Robot.txt file.

Web scrapers work through proxies to avoid getting blocked by the website security and anti-spam and anti-bot tech. They use proxy servers to hide their identity and mask their IP address to appear like regular user traffic.

But note that to be entirely covert while scraping, you need to set your tool to extract data at a much slower rate—one that matches a human user's speed.

Ease of Use

Despite relying heavily on complex programming languages and libraries, web scraping tools are easy to use. They don’t require you to be a programming or data science expert to make the most out of them.

Additionally, web scrapers prepare the data for you. Most web scrapers automatically convert the data into user-friendly formats. They also compile it into ready-to-use downloadable packets for easy access.

API Data Extraction

Google Sleep API

API stands for Application Programming Interface. But it’s not a data extraction tool as much as it’s a feature that website and software owners can choose to implement. APIs act as an intermediary, allowing websites and software to communicate and exchange data and information.

Nowadays, most websites that handle massive amounts of data have a dedicated API, such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and even Wikipedia. But while a web scraper is a tool that allows you to browse and scrape the most remote corners of a website for data, APIs are structured in their extraction of data.

How Does API Data Extraction Work?

APIs don’t ask data harvesters to respect their privacy. They enforce it into their code. APIs consist of rules that build structure and put limitations on the user experience. They control the type of data you can extract, which data sources are open for harvesting, and the type of frequency of your requests.

You can think of APIs as a website or app’s custom-made communication protocol. It has certain rules to follow and needs to speak its language before you communicate with it.

How to Use an API for Data Extraction

To use an API, you need a decent level of knowledge in the query language the website uses to ask for data using syntax. The majority of websites use JavaScript Object Notation, or JSON, in their APIs, so you need some to sharpen your knowledge if you’re going to rely on APIs.

But it doesn’t end there. Due to the large amounts of data and the varying objectives people often have, APIs usually send out raw data. While the process isn’t complex and only requires a beginner-level understanding of databases, you’re going to need to convert the data into CVS or SQL before you can do anything with it.

Fortunately, it’s not all bad using an API.

Since they’re an official tool offered by the website, you don’t have to worry about using a proxy server or getting your IP address blocked. And if you’re worried that you might cross some ethical lines and scrap data you weren’t allowed to, APIs only give you access to the data the owner wants to give.

Web Scraping vs. API: You May Need to Use Both Tools

Depending on your current level of skill, your target websites, and your goals, you may need to use both APIs and web scraping tools. If a website doesn’t have a dedicated API, using a web scraper is your only option. But, websites with an API—especially if they charge for data access—often make scraping using third-party tools near impossible.

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